125 Years Automobile & Patent "Bipolar Frame Flat Cell"

Precisely 125 years after Carl Benz patented his "vehicle with gas engine drive" and with over 80,000 other patents to its name, Daimler AG is once again awarded a patent for a pioneering technology designed to improve future mobility. At the Mercedes-Benz Stuttgart branch, Cornelia Rudloff-Schäffer, President of the German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA), presents Chairman of the Board of Management Dr Dieter Zetsche with patent document 10 2007 063 181. The "bipolar flat-cell frame" protected by this patent is considered a key step on the path to industrialising lithium-ion batteries. The new SLK from the R 172 series also celebrates its world premiere, scheduled for launch in March with many innovations, including the panoramic vario roof with MAGIC SKY CONTROL, a folding glass roof with "switchable" transparency. As part of a celebration to mark the 125th anniversary of the automobile, the company also presents the ground-breaking sculpture "Mercedes-Benz Aesthetics 125", which reveals an insight into the design of the car of the future. And in Stuttgart the green light is given for the "Mercedes-Benz F-CELL World Drive", the first circumnavigation of the world in cars powered by fuel cell electric drive.